Sometimes to tell the best lies, you have to believe in them just a little bit.

Today Kei was a conductor. A master of tickets, a local of the locomotive, and a champion of steam. Wait. Trains didn’t run on steam nowadays. Or did they ever? It’s hard to tell when studying different things for a role. Well, as long as nobody asked, Kei was a conductor, and a darned handsome one at that.

Donning her signature faux moustache and a pretty small sized uniform to fit her light frame, Kei neatly placed the hat on her slickly combed hair and proceeded out to collecting tickets for the day. That’s what conductors did, didn’t they? Except...there were no real passengers on board except for typical train staff and some oddly militarized robots. Well, there were the students and the professor but maybe they already got covered. Damn this job was tricky.

Instead of going ahead to the on passenger cart on the dust filled train, Kei just made her way out to the corridor connections and rested her back across the door in between the trains, staring out into the red leafy mess that was Forever Fall. Taking a moment to appreciate the view, Kei silently judged the streets of her memories to the mellow cascade of leaves that painted the forest red. From barely functional streets, to hard concrete jungles, and then one lair to another,and then finally a school, she had made quite a ruckus in every place she was ever in and nobody even knew who she was. A bittersweet smile arose on her lips, past the bushy moustache, and she sneezed as the prickly hairs tickled her nose and sent the thing flying off past the car.

That was fine, she guessed, she wasn’t going to miss it anyways. Besides, why can’t a girl be a conductor for once? What name should she go for? Red? Ruby? Crimson? Damned these leaves she couldn’t think of anything but red...Fine. Red it is. Red…Bark...Not exactly a good name, a rather dumb one at that, but it was probably not gonna be much of a problem since nobody asked conductors for names. Though why she was on a train was another story all together, something she had yet to confirm before acting.

In the passenger car of the Crimson Express, Professor William Nox, Illustrious dust genius extraordinaire, was busy giving tweaks to one of his many odd bots, that he so conveniently named 0ddB0ts, while four other students were promptly sitting across him as well. Next to him were several machines and gadgets that even he didn’t need at the time, but there were so many that they practically filled his side of the train. Unlike the passenger dedicated ones, the car he was currently on had no dedicated rooms and all seats were in the same open space with a bit of walking space in between. On his side he pretty much hogged them all with one set of seats holding his massive wrench, while the others hand whirring machines that seemed like they might fall apart at any moment.

The train just arrived in forever fall not too long ago and he was tasked to chaperone four huntsmen-in-training from Beacon and Atlas. Given his previous dabbles in the latter Academy, and the fact that saying no would just get people up in airs and ruin his precious work time, he agreed to taking in no more than 4 students from both schools.

The students weren’t really given a briefing though save for the rather generic message on their scrolls reading:

Several smaller details were listed below the message with the train name and destination, the cargo, that being dust and some weapons of sorts, and local possible grimm types they might encounter. Nothing seemed to out of the ordinary for a plain escort mission for their year levels though couldn’t they have relied on their defenses for that? Perhaps they were just being paranoid or maybe they had some info they weren’t sharing. Whatever it was Professor Nox didn’t seem to care and continued tweaking his odd spider-shaped robot as a single propeller drone ran itself into a corner.

“Biscuits, I need to fix the depth sensors on that one.” he groaned, dropping a screw and then scrambling after it with an extendable doohickey. He blabbered on to himself regarding sensors and screws and all sorts of incoherent technobabble which even the most advanced dust and mechanic student would have trouble comprehending before dropping the spider bot to the floor and walking over to the dead drone.

“But first...coffee.”

Wrenching his...well, wrench off the seat beside him, he plopped the thing rightside up and began dispensing some rich dark liquid from a small compartment on the side. One sip. Ugh, too greasy, but it should do. And then he downed the thing in one go, going back to working on the oddbot on the ground.

Logged

StudentsWisteria Lockheart - 1st Year student at Beacon. "Don't make me throw a book at you"Shiroe Pendragon - 1st Year Student at beacon - "This is my monochrome reality" - Team MARSLavender du Lac - 1st Year Student at Haven - "The harder I try the further things drift away." Team RWNDAyaka Miyamoto - 1st Year student at Beacon. "Tsubame Gaeshi!" - Team ALIAVermilion Desdemona - 3rd Year Student at Beacon - "Only time you'd be above me is when your head rests on my pike"Talen de L'eglantine - 3rd Year Student at Beacon Kei Almas - 4th Year Student at Beacon - "Everything is ripe for the taking!"Aurum LeBlanc - 3rd Year Student at Atlas - "Lay back, take it easy, and watch the comedy unfold"

Trains are pretty boring, most of them are old and don't have anything particularly interesting inside them save for dust or raw materials. Sometimes more interesting things, but the worst part about trains is how they love to shake around a bunch. Topaz only accepted the job to get out of Atlas for a short while and the stupid train was just a sucky part of it, almost made her reconsider. She figured that if nothing else it did pass some lovely scenery she could watch to take her mind off the shaking of the cars and how close it felt like they came to rolling off the tracks. Lucky for when she boarded who else did she find but the infamous William Nox?! Turns out he was the professor in charge of the mission! His 0ddB0ts had been a source of awe and inspiration for her for ages, quite frankly she had to fight every fiber of her being from dissembling them to see how a professional create bots.

At first, she pretended to understand what he was saying sitting forward listening intensely, but pretending to understand someone can become very very boring very very quickly forcing Topazs initial position of interest to slide into indifference, and then boredom. After a short while of resting her head on her hands, she sat up and stretched, turning towards the left to look at the other students on the train.

"So, uh, where are you guys from, or, maybe we should start with names... Yeah, I think that's a better place to start. My names Taylor, She said placing her hand on her chest to emphazie she was talking about herself.

"third-year Atlas student. Really can't wait to be done with school to be honest."She finished lowering her hand back down.

Growing up, Airi had rather severe motion sickness. It didn't matter the vehicle - car, ship, train, or airplane - she had difficulty avoiding the dizziness and nausea that so often accompanied such trips. As a result, Airi's eyes were closed. While Airi had outgrown most manners of motion sickness, except for the kind that came with travel by boat, she still kept her eyes closed and put herself into a sort of half-sleep - a holdover from when she was still affected by motion sickness. When Taylor introduced herself to the group, Airi, still eyes closed, responded, "My name is Airi, also a third year."

Vivian sat slouched in her seat as the first two introduced themselves, her attention divided by the view outside the window. Her tall faunus ears tilted in their general direction to catch what they were saying while her eyes remained locked on the gorgeous crimson landscape. It wasn't often that she passed through this area. For the moment, she wanted to enjoy the scenery. But at the same time, she realized it would probably be rude to ignore the others. After Airi had finished, she turned back to face the group, giving them a warm smile before speaking up.

"I'm Vivian, I go to Beacon. Same year as you guys." She slumped down further in her seat in an atempt to get comfier, her hands moving to the pockets of her jacket. "And you're not the only one that can't wait to get out... Gettin' a little tired of these missions where nothing happens." Perhaps it was a good thing if an assignment to protect something ended up being uneventful, but knowing that didn't make it any more exciting.

Sheer was looking out the window when they started introducing to each other. Turning his head to face his partners for this mission, well technically his senior but he's sure they won't mind, and guess it's his turn to introduce himself so "I'm Sheer and one year junior of you at second year! Aren't the view outside breathtaking? It'd be a shame if something happened to it... eh unironically! So maybe no news is good news?" The view outside is nice but a chat is more interesting even if it's just small talk, so he now turns his attention full among themselves and reached forward. "Vivian is it? Can you help me with that tray?"

Professor William Nox, dust genius, was not too fond of company to say the least. Even among students who showed interest in his work he couldn’t help but try to avoid conversation straying from his line of work. One of the students in the passenger car showed such interest in his 0ddb0ts for a fraction of a second before getting lost in his thoughts. It wasn’t at all uncommon for that to happen but the other teachers did say he needed to interact with the kids more.Pondering on how to start a conversation he opened his mouth to speak only to be interrupted by a sudden message on the intercoms. In the corner of the passenger car, a corner speaker seemingly newly added for the purposes of the people, -regular staff having messages relayed on scrolls- chimed in:

Attention all Passengers. A small group of grimm have been spotted mounting the train’s supply cars. For your safety please remain indoors and avoid changing cars while local security handle the situation. Thank you for your patience.

A friendly reminder for staff of the Crimson Express. Please do not leave tools and luggage lying around the passenger cars to avoid accidents and firmly store them in the overhead compartments. Thank You.

“Dust be damned.” The professor swore, dropping a smaller wrench as the train jostled from the back. “If you young ladies and gentlemen would kindly deal with the threat nearby, that would be great. Don’t mind the announcements, those are for rusting fools who underestimate huntresses and huntsmen in training.” Did that sound praiseworthy? He groaned for a second, bending down to reach the wrench. Whoever said programming a mech was like a conversation with the machine was a rusting idiot.

People were way harder to talk to.

Instead of sending a few 0ddb0ts to deal with the threat, William let them sit by just in case something attacked the car. If needed he’d shoot some of the blasted things themselves if it came down to it but at the moment he needed to continue maintenance. A small drone flying into your face in the middle of combat due to a faulty sensor would ruin anyone’s day.

Kei heard the announcement as she peeked into the passenger car from outside, noticing the professor preferring to stick with his machinations, and started climbing the car’s ladder. While on top she spotted several small sized nevermore harassing a couple of Atlesian knights, not numbering even a dozen, while a dozen Beowolves clawed at the side of a dust car. The distance was roughly 3 train cars away and wouldn’t take more than a moment to reach but for some reason the Grimm preferred the back. It was odd but not exactly unheard of when Grimm attacked transport vehicles so maybe this was an isolated case.

Everyone else seemed used to the small-scale attacks and seemingly didn’t care if some stupid Grimm were right on the train. The train itself seemed pretty new for train standards but the occasional scratch marks barely covered by a new coat of paint showed that it had been running quite a few trips already.

Kei decided to leave the grimm to the robots and proceeded to start climbing down before spotting an ursa major rushing a the car’s side. The thing was pretty large for ursa standards and shrugged off quite a number of blows before crashing into the Atlesian knights, sweeping them off a flat crate ladden car with a quick swipe of its paw. As much as she wanted to get rid of the thing herself she had to keep her identity hidden, and climbed down the car and back into the conductor’s quarters. A few engineers gave her a glance but otherwise were a bit shaken by the roars of the grimm to ask about her and went back to work. Were the knights really enough for the grimm? That would be impressive in its own right but she hasn’t once seen them take on larger ones without massive losses and there wasn’t a paladin in sight. Whatever, there were other students on board and they could handle it. She had more important matters to attend to.

Not too long after her little clash with Ali a few weeks back Kei had been doing some digging. It took time away from her thieving but she managed to gather some info about a possible White Fang operation in foreverfall. There were some minor clashes outside the kingdom but she did gather enough info to track the next operation here.

Whether it be covert or something larger, she wanted to be here when something happened. Maybe she could get some answers and maybe get a chance to talk with Ali again. Who knows. But hopefully she wouldn’t have to fight. She glanced back as another roar echoed through her body. Hopefully.

Logged

StudentsWisteria Lockheart - 1st Year student at Beacon. "Don't make me throw a book at you"Shiroe Pendragon - 1st Year Student at beacon - "This is my monochrome reality" - Team MARSLavender du Lac - 1st Year Student at Haven - "The harder I try the further things drift away." Team RWNDAyaka Miyamoto - 1st Year student at Beacon. "Tsubame Gaeshi!" - Team ALIAVermilion Desdemona - 3rd Year Student at Beacon - "Only time you'd be above me is when your head rests on my pike"Talen de L'eglantine - 3rd Year Student at Beacon Kei Almas - 4th Year Student at Beacon - "Everything is ripe for the taking!"Aurum LeBlanc - 3rd Year Student at Atlas - "Lay back, take it easy, and watch the comedy unfold"

"Well then, looks like we got something to do!" Topaz said before rushing down the train towards the source of the commotion. The closer she got the Grimm the louder the noises got and the faster she went until she got to the last door. Just as she was about to fling it open a loud roar that practically vibrated the train cart made her stop and consider the situation. If she got knocked off she doubted there would be much of a chance to get back on the train and she doubt it would well good either, taking this into account she put Lithium into bow configuration and notched an arrow before slamming open the door with her foot. The sight of the large Ursa major made her freeze for a half a second before her body started moving again, aiming and shooting the arrow before charging in behind.

Outside the protection of the previous cart the winds buffeted Topaz causing her to momentarily lose her footing before she quickly righted herself. Taking in the full size of the Ursa she decided that since he already lost her momentum the best plan would be back a little bit before trying again. Loading another arrow she sent it flying towards the large Grimm while backing up to where she assumed the rest of the team was.

"That's a pretty good sized one huh. Make sure not to get knocked off." She said before charging back towards it.

Jostled into alertness, Airi opened her eyes and immediately stood to her feet. Following the other students, she climbed the train ladder. The large Ursa Major was the first to catch her attention, for obvious reasons, but she couldn't help but notice the Beowolves attacking the Dust car. "We need to protect the Dust car from sustaining too much damage," she shouted over the commotion, Grimm roars, and howling of the wind. "If the Grimm critically damage it, the Dust might explode and take the train with it." Looking back at the Ursa major, which was much too big to ignore, she suggested, "We might be able to have three of us on the Ursa Major and peel off one to protect the Dust carriage."

Before Vivian could respond to Sheer, her attention was robbed by the loudspeaker as well as the subsequent roars that shook the passenger car. Along with the others she went, entirely disregarding the advice that came from the intercom. All the while, she had to wonder if her wish of having something interesting happen was partially responsible for the current attack... Next time, she would be sure to ask the universe for something involving less imminent danger.

Strolling up beside Airi, the faunus girl brought one metallic hand to her chin, humming to herself as she assessed the situation. The Ursa was definitely an issue that had to be dealt with, but if the train was blown to bits, they wouldn't have anything to protect. While she could assist in taking down the big dude, her guns wouldn't do much for her there, and her fists would only really hurt it if she could get up high enough to bash his head. Her weapons would be much more efficient at dispatching groups of smaller Grimm. Once Vivian reached her conclusion, she nodded, her hand returning to her side to draw her pistol.

"If you three wanna take him, I'll try and protect the dust. I'll shout if I need help." She looked over at the others, at least, those that had yet to charge into battle. It might be a good idea to wait for some sort of approval before she would run off. "Everybody cool with that?"

So much for snacks. With a bit of guesswork, Sheer responded with his own assessment."I'm not sure which is the bigger threat, the Major or the dozen Beowolves aiming for the Dust. I'd suggest an even split instead. Sweep them out in short order then focus on the Ursa. Sound's good? I volunteer for the Ursa." He had the firepower to take it out and should be able to utilize his semblance more effectively. Who knows, we should just try blasting it and if anything fails, he could just watch his seniors show off their superiority.

With that in mind Sheer climbed up and out of the hatch following whoever else.

The train shook violently as Ursa roared in response to Topaz's attacks, slamming its paws into the ground. The arrows were mere annoyances as they hit hard bone instead of flesh and seemed to anger it rather than do much damage. That was good though, it stopped flinging robots and crates off and turned instead to the students, some of the nevermore following suit while a few dropped to a barrage of bullets from the back. The large bear-shaped grimm scrambled towards the kids with fire in its eyes while flinging a dust cart with a massive swipe of its paw right at the archer girl.

Some of the Atlesian knights leaped onto the top of the earlier train car and began firing at the small fry, dropping beowolves and flying grimm like gnats, but occasionally got knocked down as well. The amount of grimm was quickly being diminished but the Ursa remained along with several small flying nevermore which darted towards the students like vultures at a carcass, one of the birds getting knocked out of the sky by the flying crate that headed towards the dust car while a few others attacked Sheer as he popped out of his hatch.

Nox was busy scrambling to fix his bots as the mess outside happened and an audible curse could be heard as the shaking car dropped a few of his tools on the ground.

* * *

As the fight went on Kei continued her prying, looking for hints as to what would cause the White Fang to target this particular train. It didn't seem to have more than the standard amount of dust, from what she researched, but it was quite heavily armed with robots for a simple train. Were they upping security for the dust? Or was there another reason...perhaps having something to do with the number of grimm attacking...She needed more info.

Kei watched as the students continued their fight, a look of boredom on her face. Grimm were boring and predictable to say the least but at least the train proved to be a tricky environment. Dust carts here and there, limited space, the chance of falling off and tumbling to the side like a log down a hill, maybe even a derailing. She had to get to the car at the back but the grimm blocked her way. She wouldn't want to join the fight just yet, being as crammed as it was now, so she held back but not without keeping a hand nestled near her yo-yo.

Logged

StudentsWisteria Lockheart - 1st Year student at Beacon. "Don't make me throw a book at you"Shiroe Pendragon - 1st Year Student at beacon - "This is my monochrome reality" - Team MARSLavender du Lac - 1st Year Student at Haven - "The harder I try the further things drift away." Team RWNDAyaka Miyamoto - 1st Year student at Beacon. "Tsubame Gaeshi!" - Team ALIAVermilion Desdemona - 3rd Year Student at Beacon - "Only time you'd be above me is when your head rests on my pike"Talen de L'eglantine - 3rd Year Student at Beacon Kei Almas - 4th Year Student at Beacon - "Everything is ripe for the taking!"Aurum LeBlanc - 3rd Year Student at Atlas - "Lay back, take it easy, and watch the comedy unfold"

"I've already called the Ursa! " Topaz yellowed out in response to her group making battle plans, at the best of time with her own team she would try to coordinate attacks but with a bunch of strangers on a train she figured trying to do her own thing first might be more beneficial. That thought quickly evacuated her mind as both her arrows bounced off the Ursa and it began charging towards her flinging a dust canister in her direction. Acting quickly she dropped to the ground and slide barely missing the cart taking off her head.Once again Topaz found herself without momentum but this time she decided she was too close to run away to charge. Instead, she swapped Lithium into his staff mode while getting back on her feet before swinging her weapon at the nearest leg of the Ursa. The second the blade left its leg she aggressively changed the direction of her swing and crouched down a little bit attacking the same leg.

With all the chaos, it seemed that actually coming up with a proper plan wasn't working out. The Grimm she had planned on engaging had just been gunned down by Atlesian Knights. Perhaps playing things by ear would be more appropriate for the situation. Her eyes darted around until they landed on the group of small Nevermore headed for Sheer.

"Heads up!" Not having much time to act, her semblance activated, no movement required on her part to create the translucent, glowing sphere that floated about a foot above the ground in front of her. Hopping up and stomping on it, the aura-bubble compressed before bouncing back and sending her straight up into the air. They were approaching fast, but she could spike at least one of the flying bastards, hopefully buying Sheer a little more time. She lifted her arms above her head, swinging both fists down at the top of one incoming Nevermore's skull as gravity pulled her back down towards the train.

Airi watched the fighting going on, though her attention was primarily focused on the Ursa, with it being the largest, most obvious threat. Seeing Topaz target the Ursa, she decided she would assist, disregarding Topaz's claim of having already called the Ursa. It was an Ursa, after all - not something to be trifle with. Since Topaz was targeting one of the Ursa's legs, Airi targeted the other. She got into a running start, charging at the Ursa before sliding beneath it between its legs. Right before she did so, however, she used her semblance to release a time fragment. Then, as she did slid between its legs, Airi released Timeweaver's spool and clasp mechanism, throwing the ultra-thin wire so that it caught around the other Ursa leg. She pulled hard so that it, combined with Topaz's assault on its other leg, would cause the Grimm beast to fall under its weight.

Sheer poked his head out of the train and is immediately confronted by the howling wind and then a batch of Nevermores. Sheer points his gun at them before being pelted in the face by a piece of leaf which reminded him to climb out completely.

Standing up Sheer stumbled a bit which makes him wonder just how can so much of the Grimm land on top before noticing the scratch marks on the top of the train and answered this question.

Um, Nevermore, you're dumb, don't you know piercing attacks are super effective against soft targets? Well they don't because they're young. And now they don't get to because they're getting blasted out of the sky. What Sheer didn't notice, however, is that in the time he took to get up, aim and fire at the incoming group of nevermore the rest of them is already dealing with many more Grimm than he is and getting more things done.